


professional discomfort

by Griffin Raynor (TheEbonHawk)



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Camping, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Male-Female Friendship, Not Canon Compliant, Supposedly Unemotional Character, Weird Work Relationships, tragic backstories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-20
Updated: 2020-03-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:42:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23056429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheEbonHawk/pseuds/Griffin%20Raynor
Summary: Widow doesn't know how to sleep like a normal person, so Reaper badgers her into a more comfortable position and then they have a weird, late night conversation.
Relationships: Reaper | Gabriel Reyes & Widowmaker | Amélie Lacroix
Comments: 2
Kudos: 16





	professional discomfort

**Author's Note:**

> This is another old Overwatch fic that I'm finally releasing from the 'old fic vault'. It's sort of a sequel to 'I know who you are.' Please leave kudos and comments if you liked it!

“You can't be comfortable like that.”

Widow turned her head, her cheek resting on the arm she had wrapped behind her, and looked over at Gabriel. “I do not feel any discomfort.”

She certainly didn't look comfortable: curled up on the ground with nothing to cushion her, all of her gear still strapped to her body and her gun pressed to her side. She was lying under a tree so that she could have quick access to a high vantage point, and the roots were probably digging into her back.

Gabriel, who had taken off his outer jacket to fold into a pillow and found a soft, flat patch of ground to lay on, frowned at her. “Come on, they can't program out getting a crick in your neck.”

“I do not feel-”

Gabe sighed and sat up. Amélie tended to repeat herself for emphasis, as if insisting things were really as simple as she made them sound. “I know what they did to you, Widow. You're still human. You still need to eat and shit and get some halfway decent sleep sometimes. So please, come over here where it's not as bad.”

Amélie made a face, but she slowly pushed herself up to a seated position. “You won't let it go, will you?”

He just shook his head.

Amélie stood, walked from her tree to his fireside bed, and sat next to him in one fluid, graceful movement. She looked at him blankly, like she expected more orders.

Gabriel sighed again and picked up the folded mass of his jacket. “Here. You can take this, to rest your head on. And you'll probably want to take off some of your gear so it's not bothering you.”

She placed her hand on the jacket as a sign of acceptance, but responded to the other suggestion with another blank stare.

Gabe shook his head. “No one's going to hurt you,” he promised, voice soft as he could make it. “I know if I tried anything you could kill me five different ways before I laid a finger on you.”

Amélie was not amused. “You would not try to harm me. You have no motivation and are too sentimental.”

Gabe's eyes narrowed, but he nodded. “Sentimental isn't how I'd describe myself. But the point is you'll be fine.”

Amélie hesitated, then took off her belt and laid it aside, along with her gun, keeping them close just in case. She laid down with her head on Gabe's jacket, facing him. “Are you satisfied, Gabriel?”

Gabe smiled and stretched out on his back, his arms folded behind his head. “Goodnight, kid.”

He closed his eyes, and there was silence for a few brief moments. Then, in a quiet murmur: “Gabriel?”

Gabe groaned internally: he was close to sleep, but she wouldn't leave him alone until she got whatever it was she wanted. “Hmm?”

“Did you have children?”

Oh, fuck. The question was startling, but then she wasn’t one to beat around the bush. “No,” he answered, his tone careful, like walking on thin ice. When she didn't say anything else, and his mind wouldn't stop wandering to the past, he continued. “I took in a kid for Blackwatch. Jesse. He was seventeen, and I...I kind of saw him like a son. I helped with Ana’s Fareeha when she was small. But I was waiting to have any of my own.”

“You wanted to have children?”

This was too many questions too soon, Gabriel thought. He didn't have the heart to discuss the future he'd always been looking forward to, before. “Yeah. One day. After we'd settled down, had some time to ourselves.” We were going to be married for a few years and then adopt, he thought, but didn't say. “You?”

“No.” A long silence. “Gerard did not see himself living to retire in peace. And he didn't.”

Gabe thought of Jack. How sometimes it seemed like the fighting wouldn't end until one or both of them was dead. It hadn't ended even then. “Does it hurt to talk about him?”

“No. I feel only the pride of my first kill. I knew how to use the rifle, but I had never been in combat before. I had my career then, and Gerard wanted to protect me from the war. He thought I was precious.”

Her voice was completely monotone, to the point that he couldn't even imagine an emotional tone to her words. It was still sad. 

Gabe didn't speak for a long moment. He couldn't decide whether to say what he was thinking. He didn't want to, but he felt a weird sort of obligation to respond to Amélie, to offer her the same confidence she did him. It didn't hurt her to share her story, at least not in the same way as it would hurt him, but it was still trust.

Maybe it would help her, knowing how broken he was, too.

He shifted against the ground, settling into a slightly more comfortable position. “I thought Jack was precious. But he was strong, too. He was meant to be a soldier, with or without the drugs they drowned us in. Sometimes I worried about him, but Overwatch was where he belonged.”

He glanced over at Amélie, who was watching him with muted curiosity. “I died, you know.”

She frowned, puzzled. “Pardon?”

He sat up on his elbow. “There was an accident at HQ. An explosion. I was injured, and by all accounts I was medically dead. And it was his fault. Angela revived me, but now I'm..” He gestured to his body, scarred and leaking black smoke. “It's their fault.”

Amélie looked at him, serious but blank and silent. Then she hummed a reassuring noise and shifted just a bit closer to Gabe. “We'll find him, Gabriel. We'll make him pay.” 

Gabe snorted and laid down on his back again. “You can help, amiga, but I'll be the one that makes him pay.”

“Hmm. Fair enough.” Amélie curled up beside him and fell asleep.


End file.
